Meier Henk Erik, Reinold Marcel
Forschungsartikel (Zeitschrift) | Peer reviewedWhile the politicisation of high-performance sport is perceived to represent one of thedriving forces behind doping, we know not much how exactly the cold war in sports hasaffected sporting misconduct in western societies. Therefore, we propose here todistinguish between ideological and institutional politicisation and explicit and implicitacceptance of dubious practices. We apply our framework to analyse the West German‘air clyster' affair of 1976 in order to examine to what extent the politicisation of highperformancesport during the cold war affected the search for innovation inperformance enhancement. We find that political pressure for improved competitivenessin West German sport had served to create a semi-autonomous high-performancesport sector in West Germany where blurred lines of accountability allowedquestionable practices to prosper. While the public despised the use of questionablemethods, sportive nationalism served to eclipse dubious practices. West German sportleaders adopted insofar a permissive attitude towards questionable practices as sportingmisconduct was not sanctioned. Thus, our results strongly suggest that sport'spoliticisation during the cold war facilitated the search for performance-increasingmethods in western societies.
Meier, Henk Erik | Professur für Sozialwissenschaften des Sports (Prof. Meier) |